


Chocolate

by Owlet (shinetheway)



Category: The Sentinel
Genre: M/M, Other: See Story Notes, Series: Sweets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-10
Updated: 2013-05-10
Packaged: 2017-12-11 02:18:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/792916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinetheway/pseuds/Owlet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This story is a sequel to Vanilla.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chocolate

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally a reaction to the fantastic response I got to Vanilla, and all the people who said "So where's "Chocolate"? Well, after a couple of months of writing and tweaking and considerating, here it is. Dedicated with love to my brother and sister, both of whom are now freshmen in college, and I'm sure can sympathize with Blair!
> 
> This is also in no way connected to cmshaw's fantastic story Starting With A Bang And A Whimper--it's just one more example of the fen hive mind at work. 
> 
> Warnings: slight spoilers for TSbBS   
> 

## Chocolate

by Owlet

Author's webpage: <http://www.squidge.org/~theforest/senfic.html>

Author's disclaimer: To Pet Fly goes the honor of having created these special characters; I am but the one who comes after, sweeping up their leavings. 

* * *

Chocolate by Owlet 

Jim stared at the ceiling for the fifth night in a row, listening to the _tap_ _tap_ _tap_ of fingers on keys. This was it, the hell week--the first draft of the entire dissertation was due in two weeks, and Blair had been driving himself to the brink and beyond working on it. Rough draft or no, it was still an impressive undertaking, and Jim was duly impressed--and concerned. Blair was working his hands to the bone all day, every day, coming to bed in the wee hours of the morning, only to start all over again later that morning. 

It was tearing Jim apart inside, to see his lover acting like this, but he understood.the necessity. That was why he had fought with Simon to take the week off, to make sure Blair ate and slept enough to keep going; that was why he had restrained himself from putting any more burdens on that amazingly resilient, but not superhuman, body. That was why he had resolutely kept his hands off. But tonight...tonight was the last night, tonight he was going to finish it, and tonight... 

Tonight he could finally do something. 

Something beyond listen to Blair work himself into exhaustion, and worry about what would happen when the dissertation was actually finished. Where it would leave them? What happened next? 

Where would they go from there? 

It was the kind of thing that he didn't particularly like thinking about at two in the morning, and to distract himself from worrying about it--again--he changed the subject in his head to something safer. 

Blair's hands had started hurting the first day--not surprising, what with twelve-hour days of doing nothing but type. Jim was a lousy typist in comparison to Blair, but on the third day he'd finally evicted Blair from his seat in front of his laptop and clumsily took Blair's lightning-fast dictation for two hours while Blair soaked his hands in cold water. This morning, Blair's hands had been swollen and sore, but there he still was downstairs, pecking away doggedly. 

The typing stopped, and Jim turned to see the time. Two-seventeen am. "You done down there?" he called softly, wincing as he heard Blair's ginger movements and almost soundless gasps of pain as he shifted and pushed his chair back. The whirr of a printer started, obscenely loud in the stillness of the loft. 

"Yeah," came the equally quiet answer. "It's all done." 

"Thank _God_ ," Jim muttered, rolling off the bed and padding to the stairs. It was almost summer, and he was wearing his sheerest boxers for comfort, and he knew he was putting on a show as he jogged downstairs, but Blair seemed indifferent. He was sitting at the kitchen table, head back and eyes closed, reddened hands curled on the table in front of him. 

As Jim approached, he raised his hands and arched his back, using the table as an anchor and the back of the chair as a fulcrum, letting the weight of his arms and head drag his back into a deep bow. There was a loud _crack_ and a series of smaller pops rippling up and down his spine; Jim could see the tense muscles seizing, knotting, and then suddenly relaxing, could see the increased looseness in the tense body. Blair sagged a little farther back, and then laboriously lifted his body back up and dropped his head to his chest with a quiet groan. 

Jim reached Blair and moved to hold him, crouching down wrapping his arms around the warm body from the back, only the chair separating them. Blair smiled without opening his eyes, and automatically turned his head for Jim's kiss. It lasted forever--not sexual, simply comforting, and Jim shuddered helplessly as he felt Blair relax even more beneath him. 

"Mmmm," Blair murmured when they broke apart for air. "That was good." With an effort he lifted his hands, flinched, and lowered them again. "Fuck," he muttered in frustration. 

In a single smooth motion Jim gripped the back of the chair Blair was sprawled in and swiveled it, turning it away from the table and towards himself. When Blair was facing him, Jim knelt down in front of him, between his legs. Blair perked up slightly, then sagged back, looking even more tired. 

"Jim, I don't think I can..." 

"Shut up," Jim muttered, reaching carefully for one hand. Blair fell silent as he cradled it, felt hot swollen skin throbbing with Blair's pulse, and resolutely refused to look into those eyes--embarrassed, he realized with disbelief. He, Jim Ellison, had let Blair fuck him, had sucked Blair more times than he could count, had willingly, eagerly given himself to sex with a man...and he was embarrassed to do this? 

Deliberately, he took Blair's stiff, slightly raw fingertip into into his mouth and began to suck lightly. 

Blair let out a gasp, a sharp inhalation of pure astonishment, so beautiful that Jim shivered. Then he moaned, and let his head fall again--forwards, onto his chest, hiding his face in his hair. But he didn't seem to want Jim to stop, so he didn't, moving from finger to finger to palm to wrist, then switching hands. His free hand massaged with a featherlight touch, soothing angry muscles and tendons and ligaments, while his mouth and tongue eagerly, gently devoured every inch of sweet hot skin they could. 

It was like chocolate, the finest chocolates--a dark, sweet pleasure, rich and complex and priceless. He took his time, savoring every sensation, every emotion. By the time he was finished, Blair was purring softly in the back of his throat, limp and boneless and half-asleep, and his fingers, at least, seemed to be less swollen. Jim released his wrist, and sat back on his heels. 

"Blair?" 

"Mmmmm." 

"Come on." With a heave he was on his feet; with another, stronger heave, he pulled Blair to his. "Let's go to bed." Slowly, preventing Blair from stumbling too badly in his exhaustion, he led him to the stairs. "Naomi gets here early tomorrow, you want to be awake to say hi, right?" 

"Yeah," Blair muttered, climbing the stairs as though he was seventy rather than thirty. "We gonna tell her?" 

"Yeah, Chief. After it's all over." Jim carefully stripped Blair, leaning him against the wall, and half-pushed him onto the bed. He climbed in himself, curled up around Blair, and tugged the covers over them both. "No more secrets." 

"Yeah." Blair sounded half-asleep already. "Tell her everything...Jim?" 

"Yeah?" 

"What if it all goes wrong?" 

The silence in the loft stretched out for days, and finally Jim shrugged and held Blair harder. "I don't know." 

"But Jim..." 

"I love you, Chief," Jim interrupted softly. "Go to sleep." 

"I love you too." And Blair finally gave in to the exhaustion and strain of the past week, relaxing even more into slumber. Jim felt a cold shiver run down his back at the echo of his Guide's words--his shaman's words--"What if it all goes wrong?" 

Three days later, watching a TV in Simon's office, Jim had his answer. And that night, away from the stares and the suspicion and the questions, away from the reporters that had made his life miserable and the friends who'd made his life hell, away from the dissertation and the station and the university and _everything_... 

He told Blair. 

What if it all goes wrong? 

Then life's like chocolate--sometimes when it's darkest, it ends up being the sweetest. 

The End 


End file.
